At Rotary Club of Independence on Tuesday, we heard Randolph G. Russell, a musician and businessman by past vocations. Now he is a historian and author by choice. He travels and encourages Americans to take up the cause of protecting our cultural heritage by promoting knowledge of our history to [...]
Fear over a major stock market decline continues to permeate the investor landscape. It’s amazing how high the level of fear is, considering the market has made recent all-time highs and remains within striking distance. The stock market has a history of fooling the most people, so is it possible [...]
Knowing how polarized we have become as a nation I usually make a concerted effort to avoid overtly political issues in my columns. But, as an unapologetic capitalist I felt the need to comment on the recent congressional approval of a $15 federal minimum wage and its potential economic impact. [...]
Here at last, the dog days of summer. Under normal circumstances, the stock market would usually be swooning by now from lack of attention while Big Money folks hang out in the Hamptons, hike in Maine, chic stuff like that. But as the late, great Erma Bombeck said, Normal is [...]
For nearly a year, tensions between the US and China regarding trade have had a negative impact on the stock market. Many investors are now concerned that a full blown trade war is inevitable. One of the primary reasons for President Trump’s willingness to impose stiff tariffs on Chinese imports [...]
Today’s column is designed to give you a little better understanding of what is going on inside the black box of your investments. Hopefully it will be enlightening. If you are a DIY investor, this principle is quite important for you to know or study. On television Mr. Market seems [...]
Anyone who reads my column regularly probably knows I’m a planner. There are rarely occasions where I make a decision before researching the matter in depth weighing both the pros and the cons. This desire to always have a plan, probably stems from the fact that I feel an overwhelming need to always be [...]
For investors, proper perspective is about the most important quality one can possess. I am referring to the practice of viewing where we are in terms of historical benchmarks and the statistical probabilities from long history Our shared human condition is that we are creatures of the here and now. [...]
It was a little over a year ago that I opined on the sad news that a beloved part of my own childhood Toys R Us would be permanently shutting its doors. Recently, Sears declared bankruptcy and it would appear that another priceless piece of my childhood might soon be [...]
Life can only be understood backwards; but it must be lived forwards, observed Soren Kirkegaard, 19th Century Danish philosopher. Therefore, we must examine at least briefly what occurred during 2018 in the worldwide financial markets. As noted in prior columns, probabilities were high that it would produce a stock market [...]
